Homeownership the NeighborWorks Way: Prepare, Invest and Retain

By Marietta Rodriguez
director, National
Homeownership
Programs & Lending

Every June is National Homeownership Month. While the most recent housing crisis has perhaps put homeownership into question, homeownership provides many benefits to homeowners and to communities. Sufficient preparation when considering homeownership is critical. We like to call the services NeighborWorks provides homeownership the NeighborWorks way.

While homeownership may not be the right choice for every person at every stage of their lives, homeownership is an important cornerstone of our communities. And NeighborWorks America and the NeighborWorks network are trusted resources for homeowners, creating thousands of homeowners each year. In 2012 NeighborWorks America and the NeighborWorks network helped 15,000 homebuyers achieve their dream of homeownership.

For 35 years, NeighborWorks America and the NeighborWorks network have provided access to homeownership and to quality housing in thousands of communities across the country. The more than 240 NeighborWorks organizations across the country provide current and potential homeowners a suite of specialized homeownership programs and services. These include an analysis of homebuyer readiness, comprehensive education on the homebuying process, one-on-one financial coaching, important information about the availability of possible financial assistance with down payment and closing costs, and access to affordable mortgage products.

Preparing for Homeownership with Pre-Purchase Education 

Successful homeownership requires more than just having enough money on hand. It’s about knowing how to navigate the home buying process, what to expect once you become a homeowner, and having a reliable partner to turn to when questions come up. For example, for many homebuyers, pre-purchase homebuyer education and counseling is a critical component to successful and sustainable homeownership.

NeighborWorks organizations, located in every state, are a great place for prospective homeowners to start because they help individuals become mortgage-ready and better equipped to manage the process. Counselors work with individuals to ensure their credit profile reflects strength and help identify experts who could explain what kind of maintenance – immediate or long-term – the home may need.

It is important to remember not all mortgages are created equal. NeighborWorks counselors can help potential homeowners secure a mortgage suitable to their current needs. In addition, NeighborWorks services offer a free or low cost alternative to  higher cost services,  and that’s an important distinction. Ultimately, it’s a NeighborWorks homeownership counselor’s goal to make sure that each homeowner is matched with the right homeownership products. In 2012 NeighborWorks organizations provided nearly 122,000 individuals and families with education and counseling services.

Providing Help through a Network of HomeOwnership Centers

NeighborWorks America’s National Homeownership Programs offer technical assistance and grants to our network that, in turn, provide a continuum of strategies to help ensure successful, sustainable homeownership for people of modest means in every state. There are more than 100 NeighborWorks HomeOwnership Centers around the country, and many offer affordable first and second mortgages. They are “one-stop” shops for prospective homebuyers and homeowners. Customers can access all of the services and training necessary to shop for, purchase, renovate, maintain, and manage a home. To locate a NeighborWorks HomeOwnership Center, visit here.

NeighborWorks America knows that for many individuals the road to homeownership can seem, at times, challenging. But dependable NeighborWorks staff work hard every day to make the dreams of homeownership a reality for thousands of individuals every year. Join us in celebrating those who will achieve their homeownership dreams in 2013 and help us ensure all those interested in pursuing homeownership know about homeownership the NeighborWorks way: prepare, invest and retain!

Enterprise Rose Fellowship Redefines Community Design at NeighborWorks Organizations

Blog by Kat Miller, NeighborWorks Rural Initiative
Miller is an AmeriCorps VISTA and recent graduate of Smith College, where she studied architecture.

The Enterprise Rose Architectural Fellowship, is a highly competitive and innovative program that places some of the nation’s finest early career architects in underserved communities across the country to team up with community development host organizations. The program is headed by Enterprise Community Partners’ National Design Initiatives, which offers a variety of programs that help build capacity for design leadership across the community development field.

The Rural Initiative and NeighborWorks America staff with
Rose Fellow Mark Matel (left) at the Bartlett bus yards 

NeighborWorks America is proud to have two Enterprise Rose Fellows currently working at NeighborWorks organizations: Geoffrey Barton at Mountain Housing Opportunities in Asheville, North Carolina and Mark Matel at Nuestra Comunidad Development Corporation in the Roxbury neighborhood of Boston.

By bringing designers directly into the communities in which they are working, the Rose Fellowship boosts an organization’s capacity to create affordable, sustainable, and well designed communities. We often think about design as being strictly aesthetic. Good design, however, must be measured more three dimensionally; as something that transforms not only appearance, but also performance. To achieve this, the Rose Fellowship boasts a bottom-up approach towards design. This approach rests upon three core principles:  design excellence, sustainability, and first and foremost, community engagement.
 
Mark has certainly embraced this bottom-up approach as Project Manager for Bartlett Place, Nuestra Comunidad’s new mixed-use development that is transforming a vacant eight acre bus yard into a “creative village”. Tapping into Roxbury’s rich artists’ population, Bartlett Place will offer a variety of public spaces, commercial storefronts, and housing types to both provide new opportunities for current neighborhood residents and attract new populations.

As Project Manager, Mark is involved with overseeing all aspects of the project ranging from site planning to real estate development to contracting, etc.  Perhaps the most interesting aspect of Bartlett Place, however, has emerged in between the planning and construction phases of the project. As a liaison between the production team and Bartlett’s primary client, the Roxbury community, Mark has facilitated “Bartlett Events,” as a platform to raise excitement and engage the community in the months leading up to construction. An of example of this is MuralFest, Bartlett’s kickoff event  where local artists came together to beautify the site with murals and sculpture, transforming the old Bartlett bus yards from a drab vacant field of asphalt into a vibrant arts/events space. This new space will be used throughout the summer to keep Bartlett alive until construction starts next fall.  

In addition to providing interim programming for the site, Bartlett Events is also being used as a way to test ideas that can be re-integrated into Bartlett Place permanently. In this way, Bartlett’s design process is fundamentally rooted in the community. 

Our visit to Nuestra Comunidad and the Bartlett Yards demonstrated that good community-based design is as much about dealing with social issues as it is about dealing with architecture and building issues. This concept is certainly evident in the community-based design work that Mark is doing at Bartlett, and is echoed across the country, where a legacy of other Rose Fellows tackle similar design issues in underserved communities. 

Take a look at what Rose Fellow, Geoffrey Barton, is working on at Mountain Housing Opportunities  (one of our newest additions to the NeighborWorks Rural Initiative!) and visit the Enterprise National Design Initiatives website to learn more about the fellowship and their other programs. Applications for the Enterprise Pre-Development Design Grant are now open and close on July 10.  

Finding a Purpose: How Vacant Buildings Can Support Neighborhood Marketing

Reposted from the Stable Communities blog

Finding new uses for vacant buildings is something many nonprofit housing organizations are getting good at, but some properties — like an abandoned movie theater — are harder to rework. With creative thinking, however, empty buildings can be used to spark new interest in old neighborhoods.

Last year, after looking closely at the prominent features of an old, vacant movie theater, NeighborWorks Waco (TX) decided that its brick interior and artistic vibe made the perfect setting for a “pop up” art exhibit. Now in its second year, Art on Elm Avenue puts this otherwise empty space to good use, and is helping the neighborhood to rebrand itself as an arts district.

Art on Elm Avenue is a one-day event featuring 14 local artists and more than 10 local student artists. In addition to the exhibit, local bands provide live music, food and craft vendors sell food and handmade goods, and a local performance artist creates paintings with his bare hands and a spinning canvas (think Jimi Hendrix and Elvis). Kids’ activities include a bounce house, crafts, snowcones and popcorn, plus an 18-foot canvas mural project where kids develop the plan and create the mural with a touch of advice from volunteer art supervisors.

Each artist featured in the exhibit is allowed to bring up to three approved artworks, which may be two-dimensional pieces such as paintings, drawings, prints or photography, or three-dimensional works such as sculpture and ceramics. Artists are provided with a name plate next to their pieces and can list items for sale.

Art on Elm Avenue is free for both artists and guests. It’s a celebration of art and community that fits nicely into NeighborWorks Waco’s neighborhood marketing strategy. The event draws businesses, entrepreneurs and residents who may not otherwise visit this area, and also celebrates local culture and supports the neighborhood’s plan to become an arts district. It builds community relationships and puts vacant space to positive use. “This event brings everyone together from all parts of Waco,” says Honey Jenkins, NW Waco’s director of marketing. “It draws people of all ages and from all walks of life to Elm Avenue, and helps them to see what it used to be and what it can become.”

This year, Art on Elm Avenue took place on the same weekend as one of the city’s monthly musical events — an Eddie Money concert — so the two groups decided to co-market their events as part of a larger celebration called "Weekend in Waco.” Linking the two events in marketing helped boost attendance; more than 2,500 people attended this year as compared to about 500 last year.

To learn more, visit the Art on Elm Avenue Facebook page or follow events on its Twitter feed.

Homebuyer Education Critical, Especially in Rural Communities

This blog is reposted from CFED's website. Erica Bradley works with the NeighborWorks America Rural Initiative.

For years, community development professionals were advocates for financial education. Not many lenders, and certainly not customers, took financial education seriously, until the housing bubble burst in 2008. In rural markets, homebuyers typically do not have the same access to services, like homebuyer education. For many rural organizations, expanding their services to include online financial education courses has allowed them to reach more customers.

Tammy Hyman, homeownership program administrator at PathStone, always knew how important homeownership counseling is. PathStone, she said, had offered it since the late ‘90’s. “If they would have done (homeownership counseling) back then, we wouldn’t be having these issues now,” she said of the lenders.

PathStone, which is headquartered in Rochester, serves New York, Vermont, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Virginia, Ohio, Indiana and parts of Puerto Rico. Many of the markets they serve are rural, and homeownership counseling is offered in Indiana, New York and Pennsylvania.

Hyman said clients have the option of taking an in-person training, which consists of an eight-hour course, or they can take an online course from eHome America. eHome America is a certified provider of online homebuyer education.

For the in-person class, the requirement is an eight- to ten-hour day. Hyman said she tries to include guest speakers, such as real estate agents or lenders. The course is held every other month or sometimes quarterly, depending on the demand for it. Hyman estimates there are 8-18 students in each class.
If the client chooses to take the online course, Hyman said, a staff person schedules a one-on-one call to discuss the course material and answer any questions the client has. Hyman said the benefit to the eHome course is it allows people to take the course at a convenient time for them.
Like PathStone, Neighborhood Housing Services (NHS) of Richland County also offers an in-person homebuyer education course as well as the eHome course. NHS of Richland County covers several counties in Southwest Wisconsin, including an area where homebuyer education was not offered.

Linda Smith, NHS of Richland County homeownership center coordinator, said they offer in-person courses, and they attempted to offer distance learning classes. The distance courses were broadcast from the main Richland Center site to remote sites, typically high school classrooms, in neighboring counties. Smith said because broadcasting the course was too staff-intensive, and there were technology problems, the remote course was cancelled. They are now using eHome America for their customers who cannot attend the course in Richland Center, which has gotten a great response. “eHome, because we are rural, is a good fit. It fits the needs for many of our households, especially the younger households who cannot attend classes at night or on the weekends,” she said.

Like PathStone, NHS requires customers who have taken the eHome course to have a phone conference with a staff person.

Gary Throckmorton, eHome senior executive vice president, said eHome’s model is a network of local agencies. “We want the customer to be connected to a local agency. Follow-up is key,” he said. eHome has had steady growth, he said, and approximately 250 agencies are registered with over 36,000 clients served since 2009. Throckmorton expects growth to continue, especially since online education has become more accepted. eHome is currently offered in English and Spanish, but Throckmorton said adding additional languages would be considered if there was a demand.

eHome America was started in May 2009 by Community Ventures Corporation (CVC), a Kentucky-based non-profit. It is endorsed by NeighborWorks America.

NeighborWorks D.C. Headquarters Move Information

By Alexandra Chaikin,
Online Media Project Manager

We're in our new offices! The D.C. staff is in our new office and all systems are back online, including email and website functionality. There may, however, be delays with getting changes made to nw.org.Information is forthcoming on how D.C. phones will work.

If you are sending any physical mail to the D.C. office, fear not. All mail will be forwarded to our new address for several months. In fact, we'd prefer you use the current D.C. address until May 28. The new address will be 999 Capitol Street N.E., Suite 900, Washington, D.C. 20002.

During the blackout, I'll be managing our Facebook and Twitter channels so you will be able to ask questions and get help that way. We are investigating the situation with D.C. telephones.We'll keep you posted. We anticipate phone services to our field offices will be unaffected, though their email will be down as part of the network blackout.

If you need to contact one of our field offices, use this phone directory on Google docs. 

Thank you for your support and understanding!